In the stead of larger-than-life characters, their key helpers get overlooked, and that is certainly the case with John Holmes Overton (1875-1948), whose time in politics was longer than that of his famous friend, Huey Long.
An attorney by profession, Overton attempted to get into office in 1918 when he ran for the Senate, but lost the primary to Edward Gay, who served only a short time before opting to call it quits. In the meantime, Overton befriended the considerably younger Huey Long of the Louisiana Public Service Commission, which if it was in any part political calculation, it was a highly intelligent one. Although Long’s first bid for governor failed in 1924, four years later he was elected. His methods of using (and abusing) his power resulted in his impeachment in 1929, and in the process, Overton served as his counsel. He defended him thusly, in language that perhaps we find familiar, “I’ve supported every governor that has been elected in Louisiana for twenty-five years, all on promises that they have made to the people. Not one of them has been able or, if able, willing to carry out what was expected of him. The present governor is throwing out of office the clique that all other governors promised to throw out. He is backed to the wall in his efforts to redeem his campaign pledge” (Long, 149). After a round robin statement was issued by a group of state senators that they wouldn’t impeach him under any circumstances, it was clear that Long would remain in office. In 1930, Overton was elected to the House for a single term, and his voting was at that time on the liberal side. As a loyal Long man, Long was sure to throw his weight in support of him in the 1932 Senate election, in which he defeated Edwin Broussard, who was of the Democratic Party’s conservative wing. It sure didn’t help Broussard that he hadn’t supported Long’s run for the Senate two years earlier. From 1933 to 1935, Overton served with Long in the Senate, and Overton mostly voted with Long, although unlike Long he voted for the Reciprocal Trade Act in 1934.
Overton’s political benefactor was assassinated in 1935, but his career survived; he was easily renominated in his own right in 1938. Incidentally, after his reelection, his record began increasingly shifting to the right. Like many Southerners during the Roosevelt Administration, Overton grew more conservative over time despite his initial support of New Deal laws. In 1939, Overton voted against the Neutrality Act Amendments, which repealed the arms embargo, thus permitting the US to trade arms with belligerent nations. However, he would support the Lend-Lease Act in 1941. By 1944, the rotund Overton was in declining health, and he initially announced that he would not run again. However, pleas to reconsider from many of his Senate colleagues as well as Governor James Noe announcing that he would run for the Senate convinced him to reconsider, and he won renomination (which was tantamount to reelection for a Democrat in Louisiana).
Overton vs. Daylight Savings Time
Of all the senators, no one was more opposed to Daylight Savings Time than John Overton. Daylight Savings Time was used inconsistently since World War I, but President Roosevelt reenacted it in 1942, which lasted until September 30, 1945 (national daylight savings time would come long-term with the Uniform Time Act of 1966). Overton in response threatened to place an ad in the lost and found section of the newspaper reading, “Lost — somewhere between sunrise and sunset, one golden hour, set with 60 diamond minutes. No reward is offered; it is lost forever” (Hill). Overton would not even in practice accept it during this time. His office’s schedule ran on what he referred to as “God’s time”, placing a sign on his office that read, “This Office Runs on God’s Time”, and this humorously made coordinating meetings with him a bit of a challenge for his fellow Louisianan Allen Ellender (Hill).
The 80th Congress and the End
In 1947, Overton attempted to have Senator Theodore Bilbo (D-Miss.) seated, which the Republican majority refused to do due to Bilbo’s publicly implying that intimidation and violence should be used to prevent blacks from voting. Although Huey Long was seen as favorable to the working man, Overton came to the conclusion that many Southerners and Republicans had…labor unions had become too powerful. To liberals, his vote for the Taft-Hartley Act was a repudiation of the working man. George S. Long, Huey Long’s brother, wrote to him that “you have quit the people who elected you to office” (Hill). In the 80th Congress, the liberal Americans for Democratic Action found that in 1947 he had voted their way 5 out of 9 times and the following year 5 out of 8 times. His overall DW-Nominate score was -0.053, which is just a hair higher than that of departing Senator Joe Manchin of West Virginia, and lower than that of Susan Collins. Per that scaling system, Overton is both to the right of all Democrats serving in Congress and to the left of all Republicans serving in Congress. Overton supported Truman’s foreign policy as well as his stance against GOP-pushed tax reductions in the 80th Congress, while opposing public housing and the nomination of David Lilienthal to head the Atomic Energy Commission. His poor health caught up with him in May 1948 when he developed an intestinal obstruction. Although he had emergency surgery, he died on the 14th.
References
Congressional Supplement. (1948). Americans for Democratic Action.
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Hill, R. (2016, May 1). Huey Long’s Lawyer: Senator John Overton of Louisiana. The Knoxville Focus.
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Long, H.P. (1933). Every man a king: the autobiography of Huey P. Long. New Orleans, LA: National Book Club, Inc.
Overton, John Holmes. Voteview.
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https://voteview.com/person/7126/john-holmes-overton
Report Card for 80th Congress. (1947). Americans for Democratic Action.
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S. Res 1. White Motion That the Oath of Office be Administered to Brewster. Taft Motion to Table Overton Motion to Substitute the Name of Bilbo. Govtrack.
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Mad Politics: The Bizarre, Fascinating, and Unknown of American Political History 